Josh Pastner ACC Coach of the Year? You are kidding me?

There was a lot strange about the All-ACC voting this year, but I guess with 15 teams most voters on the newly formed committee weren’t watching the right things. Tell me how Justin Jackson runs away with Player of the Year but doesn’t make unanimous first team All-ACC, while Luke Kennard does but finishes a distant third in the POY voting.

Coach of the Year absolutely blows my mind. Yes, Georgia Tech’s Josh Pastner had a nice season, winning 17 games and upsetting Carolina in the ACC opener. But did the committee vote after that game and quit watching the rest of the season? Tech lost four of its last six games and was blown out at Syracuse in the season finale. The 8-10 Yellow Jackets were picked 14th in the ACC and wound up 11th. Big whoop, now that’s really exceeding expectations.

Roy Williams won the ACC outright for the second straight year. This season, his Tar Heels were picked third and won the league by two full games over Florida State, Notre Dame, Louisville and Duke. UNC also won by two games last year and Ol’ Roy didn’t win Coach of the Year in 2016 either; he was the third coach in the history of the ACC to finish first two straight times and not win Coach of the Year either season. Pastner beat Williams by 16 votes.

How can Williams NOT be coach of the year in the ACC? Here’s a stat for you. His Tar Heels have played Duke at the end of the regular season seven times for a share or outright first place in the conference? You know what Roy’s record is in those seven games? 7 and 0. UNC lost two All-ACC starters and Carolina jersey retirees from the Final Four team a year ago, and the Heels are back on the one line for an NCAA Tournament seed.

Williams is subject to what his mentor Dean Smith suffered, the curse of expectations. Everyone assumes the Tar Heels will be good, so don’t give Roy credit if they turn out to better than that. Ever heard of the old saying, it’s harder to stay on top than get there?

Let’s see what Josh Pastner does next year. Maybe top 10 – in the ACC.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Related Stories
‹
Chansky's Notebook: Fool Me Once...
Little Kool-Aid will be consumed by Carolina fans before the noon kickoff from Dublin. Fool me once but not again. It is a great trip to Ireland for the Tar Heels fans who bought the plane tickets and hotel rooms to tour the Emerald Isle and see if their team is any better than Bill […]
Chansky's Notebook: Getting Filthy Rich-er
There are seven teams with $40 million plus rosters and five others just behind the tally from college football as the 2026 season begins. The SEC leads payrolls (LSU, Texas, Texas A&M, Georgia, Ole Miss and Tennessee), with four from the Big Ten (Ohio State, Oregon, Michigan and USC), one from the ACC (Miami) and […]
Chansky's Notebook: Power to the People!
Wednesday's announcement of a two-year, two-game series between UNC and NC State in Greensboro sent a clear message.
Chansky's Notebook: The Five Stages
Chapelboro's Michael Koh breaks down the stunning news of Seth Trimble's commitment to Louisville via the transfer portal.
Chansky's Notebook: Carolina Conundrum
There is no question Mike Lombardi will lose his job as football general manager and leave Chapel Hill, writes Art Chansky.
Chansky's Notebook: The One Who Got Away
Mack Brown was a very good football coach. His father was a high school coach in Tennessee, and his older brother Watson preceded him into mid-major positions. The peripatetic Brown held nine assistant jobs and one as a head coach in 15 years before he was 35. That included being the athletic director at Tulane […]
Chansky's Notebook: The Cost of Business
Carolina has released its salary structure for the 2026-27 men’s basketball season, and right now it has to be a game of wait and see. Mike Malone is making $7.5 million in his first college head coaching season and his new top assistant Chuck Martin is making $500,000. Here is where it gets interesting. The […]
Chansky's Notebook: Code of Conduct
When he left Carolina as chancellor in 2024, Kevin Guskiewicz was dogged by policy confrontations with the UNC Board of Trustees. Guskiewicz found himself in the same position after only two years at Michigan State despite strong support from Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and the Spartans’ Hall of Fame basketball coach Tom Izzo. He visited […]
Chansky's Notebook: What Happened to Henri?
Blame Henri Veesaar's baffling slide in the NBA Draft on the muddled way the league and its agents do business.
Chansky's Notebook: Dunia the Great
Of all the athletes who competed at Carolina over the years, there is no one in the same ballpark as Dunia Sibomana-Rodriguez. His life-changing moment occurred when he was six years old and survived an attack from vicious chimpanzees in his native Democratic Republic of the Congo. The 18-year-old UNC prodigy who is on a […]
›